Red letter day

DENIS SMITH has spoken of his admiration for Liverpool after admitting that without last Wednesday's friendly against the Merseyside giants the club's future would have been placed even further in jeopardy.

DENIS SMITH has spoken of his admiration for Liverpool after admitting that without last Wednesday's friendly against the Merseyside giants the club's future would have been placed even further in jeopardy.

With the Dragons' perilous financial situation well documented, a bumper crowd of 14,978 saw Wrexham break the £150,000 gate receipts mark, smashing their previous best received for a cup encounter against Everton in October 2002.

The income came as a massive boost for the debt-ridden Dragons, and manager Smith was delighted that Liverpool came to the Racecourse, thus guaranteeing a near-capacity attendance.

He said: 'It's great to see a club of that size giving back something to the game. Without doubt it has kept us going throughout the summer and we're all thankful for that.'

Although Smith said he enjoyed seeing a full Racecourse, he admitted that he'd like nothing more to see a repeat of that over the coming season.

'Regular big gates change the whole outlook of the club,' he said.

'Better gates may mean more money to spend, and it may allow me to go the chairman and say I need to improve there, there and there.

'But we have to be realistic. Sheffield Wednesday finished below us last season, but they are sometimes attracting gates of 20,000. Hull City, who've just come up, are getting 15,000.

'It's a fact of life. Our gates suggest we are a smaller club, but I'd love to see bigger crowds here because we can have a good team.' Smith will now put in his players through their paces in the run-up to the League One opener against Swindon Town on August 7.

However, Wrexham's preparations will include just one more pre-season game - against Hereford United on Saturday - having already under-taken an extremely demanding schedule.

Squeezed around the 2-1 defeat to Liverpool, Wrexham competed in the annual Isle of Man Football Festival, which included a trio of battles against Port Vale, Bristol Rovers and Carlisle United.

Although the Dragons finished third in the tournament after a play-off victory over Carlisle, Denis Smith feels the games have taken more than enough out of his players.

'When you've played the amount of games we have in such a short space of time, you expect to pick up a few injuries,' said the boss.

'So it's not that we won't be working hard in training, not in the slightest. It's just that the work will be more controlled which sometimes you can't get in games.